problem syncing audio and video

Hi!
im new here!
me and my friends filmed a short clip, recording separately audio and video.
the audio was recorded using a zoom h6.
when im trying to sync the audio to the video on FCP like i learned online its not doing it properly for some reason.
first of all, FCP creates only one synced file with multiple videos, but not all the videos...
secondly, its not matching all the videos to all the sound tracks...
what should i do? it will take hours to watch al the takes and trying to match to the audio manually...


my process is so:
i import both audio and video files to FCP
then i cmd+a  to choose them all, and then i go to Clip>Synchronise Clips.
it was loading for almost an hour, and the results where like i wrote before.

please help me!

Hi, I'm a newbie here too. I saw your question and created an account to see if I could help based on my experience. I regularly use a Canon DSLR and an H4 for audio separately. What I've learned the hard way is to make sure every camera (if a multiple shoot) and every audio recording device is set to record audio at the same kHz. iPhone's for some reason do 44khz for example, so they are a pain to mix up for a multi cam edit in FCPX without extra steps. So, if you do discover that your video and audio are at different kHz then the fix I usually use is to bring the oddball one of the mix into Compressor and export it out at the matching kHz. Again, I'm no expert but just wanted to see if the stuff I've experienced could get you out of a jam without a lot of digging. There are a TON of very qualified folks on these forums who have helped me so much over the years so maybe someone more experience in the audio area can offer additional info. Hope you get it fixed quick!

If you have more than one video clip that you're trying to sync with a single audio file, it would probably be best to just set it up as a Multicam clip rather than use the Syncronize Clip feature. Even if it's multiple audio files I always create MultiCam clips when I'm syncing audio. I think you might have better luck.

Welcome to the forums!

Doug is correct. If you have many different video clips with in-camera audio for each clip plus a single external audio file for the entire shoot, it will be much easier for you to create a multicam clip from the single external audio file and all the different video clips. FCP will compare the audio of the external file with the audio of all the individual video clips to sync them all.

If you have shot many different video clips and you also have recorded a separate external audio file for each clip, you will need to sync every clip individually with its corresponding external audio file. For this, you can either use the Synchronize Clip function or the Multicam function. Both options will yield great results.

Elm Tree Media is also correct: zoom devices, phones, DSLRs and whatnot can record audio in very different ways. If the audio on the video clips was recorded at a different sample rate than the zoom audio file(s), you may have audio drift and those clips will be difficult sync. As you haven't provided any information about this, it's hard to tell if this will be a problem or not.

- Ronny

thanks guys.
i have about 100 -+ video files and x3 audio files. will the multi cam option work best for this scenario? there was at least 2 mics recording at any given time, so each video clip has at least 2 audio matches...
if multi cam is the best option, where can i find a good tutorial?
thanks a lot!

so youre saying i have to go through about 100+ videos and over 300 audio tracks manually? i thought FCP can do this for me, it will take me forever...
is there an external app that might do it automatically?
thanks!

So you have 100+ video clips plus 2 or 3 external audio clips for each video clip. And I assume you didn't sync the camera and the zoom recorder by time code? Or you didn't assign unique ID's to the video clips and their corresponding external audio clips? 

In that case, the only way you can try to automatically sync all these loose media is with an app called PluralEyes. It's not perfect and it will put all the clips on one long timeline. But it integrates quite well with FCP and it's worth a shot.

- Ronny

Hi Urilivni, Welcome to the fcp.co forums.
Not sure what the parameters of the project are, i.e. is this guided by a single audio or video file?  Concert maybe??
Is it possible to breakup the project via time/date stamp (assuming the recording devices all have correct time/date set or manually corrected for offset) and create multiple synced or multicam clips? Each time/date grouped clips should be related together to the storyline.  
Throwing 100 vid files 300+ audio files into one big heap maybe asking for issues. Breaking them up makes it easier.  FCPX is fantastic in creating synced/multicam clips, but there are many limits/ways that make this task hard. Given that you have at least 3 audio recordings per take, the distance between the mics, room acoustics, echo, etc… can cause timing issues. As mentioned, check sample rates and realize that audio drift is more pronounced the longer the clip, so no matter what, I predict that you will indeed need to check all timeline clips for sync.
Breaking up the project into 50-100 video clips with 3/4 audio clips attached would also make it easier to correct the audio channels at clip level without affecting the rest of the timeline.
Anyway, just another approach.
Hope this Helps, Greg
Happy Editing

Also, don't forget to assign camera angles and/or names to the clips from each camera. This will help FCP put each camera into its own angle. support.apple.com/guide/final-cut-pro/mu...flow-ver10e087fd/mac

Urilivni wrote:

so youre saying i have to go through about 100+ videos and over 300 audio tracks manually? i thought FCP can do this for me, it will take me forever...

If you still have access to the recording devices and they haven't been altered, it is possible to examine each one and determine the time differential to current time of day. All the files from each device should have the same "delta time" vs true time of day. E.g, maybe Cam A was + 7 min fast and audio recorder B was minus 5 minutes slow.

The goal is bulk update the creation times within FCP to compensate for the incorrect device time of day, which then will make all the files from each device sort adjacently. That by itself will not synchronize them but it may expedite inspection or touch up of sync issues. 

Normally all the files from each device are offloaded to separate folders, or sometimes the files have names  unique to the device. Once they are in separate folders, you can import those using the FCP preference "keywords: from folders". That will automatically tag each group of files from each device with the unique folder name.

Once within FCP you can then use that keyword to select all files from a single device and adjust the creation time using Modify>Adjust clip date and time. 

In general if you have hundreds of clips from various devices, sync by audio is not sufficiently reliable. Provided the clips are all prepped properly with camera names or angle names, it might be possible to sync groups of clips which are chronologically adjacent. E.g, the first 20 A/V clips synced with the corresponding audio clips, then the next group.

Normally for hundreds of separate clips from multiple devices that cover the same event, you need something like an external timecode device on each camera or recorder:  tentaclesync.com

In some cases you can use a "poor man's timecode" method by pre-synchronizing all devices before shooting. Dave Dugdale demonstrates it in this video:



If no other options exist you can try Plural Eyes. It has more advanced audio sync algorithms than FCP but it's not perfect:  www.maxon.net/en/red-giant-complete/pluraleyes